weekly grocery list (last updated 05/2024)
- Buy these every week (the portions perfectly fit 1 week / 1 person / 1 meal a day):
- 1 pound bag of kale/spinach - easy prep, and tastes the best out of green vegetables (imo)
- Bananas
- Shredded or cottage cheese
- Milk - half gallon
- A bunch of Birds Eye frozen meals. Pretty much a frozen dinner but healthier, less packaging, and more calorie per buck
- Red's frozen burritos (not sponsored)
- Grains:
- White pasta. (Used to eat whole grain but that was unsustainable)
- Brown (basmati) rice
- Corn or whole wheat tortillas - instant prep
- Ezekiel bread
- Vegetables
- Frozen: broccoli, peas, onions, green beans, carrots, mushrooms
- Canned tomato (basically a vegetable)
- Proteins:
- Eggs
- Mixed nuts
- Peanut butter - find ones with no added oils. It takes getting used to, but the eating experience becomes the same as with "normal" peanut butter
- Bell & Evans frozen cooked chicken - instant prep and healthy. Most notably, it's low sodium compared to other frozen chickens. I used to think this tasted really plain, but after a few weeks of eating this, other frozen chickens brands taste too salty
- Bell & Evans frozen chicken patties - easy prep, lasts long, and relatively healthy. Tastes better than the precooked chicken
- Ground beef 90/10, or pork, or turkey patties
- Canned sardines in water - instant prep
- Canned black beans - instant prep
- Frozen salmon
- Fruits:
- Frozen berries
- Frozen avocado
- Once every few months:
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Minced garlic
- Every spice. Just get the pre-mixed ones
- Other junk:
- Low sodium soups
- Popcorn - low fat
- Kimchi or sauerkraut or pickles
- Kikkoman soup powders / hondashi, soy sauce, mirin, dry ramen - be careful of dry ramen that have a lot of sodium (not in the soup. yes that's as thing). prefer soba.
- Retired foods - I wouldn't go out of my way to avoid these foods at restaurants and such, but I wouldn't want to buy these at the grocery store:
- Ramen - most brands are super processed. Buy soup + noodle separately (see above)
- El Monterey taquitos - too processed. just get Red's. (I'm not sponsored by anyone)
- Shrimp - expensive, high in cholesterol. Not horrible but not worth it
- Pringles - these should be banned. from everywhere. same with any other super processed snacks.
- White rice - high GI. I think all high GI carbs happen to taste really good which is unfortunate.
- Bread (including whole grain) - meh
- Frozen dinners - convenient and tastes good, but is often super high in sodium. Or feels like a waste of a lot of plastic. (I still sometimes get these though.)
- Barley - healthy, but takes too long to boil, and doesn't taste very good
- Naan - high GI. Not horrible but not worth it
- Potatoes - high GI
- Apples and oranges - my most eaten fruits from high school and college cafeterias. But theyy taste too sweet/sour